NEWSWIRE

BAGAI LEADS CANADA TO WARM-UP WIN

Ashish Bagai hit his maiden T20 half century as Canada cruised to a 7 wicket win over Afghanistan in the first warm up match of the World Twenty20 qualification tournament in Abu Dhabi this morning. Losing the toss and being put into bowl, Canada remainded disciplined with Henry Osinde (1-21), Harvir Baidwan (1-27), Raza Rehman (2-26), and Junaid Siddiqui (1-14) each picking up wickets to have Afghanistan knocked back for 128-5 from their 20 overs.

Hiral Patel (10) and Ruvindu Gunasekera (39) started cautiously for Canada and with the lost of Patel, the Captain strode in at 3 putting on 67 runs with Gunasekera and 21 runs with Jimmy Hansra (9) to all but chase down the target. Hansra was stumped late but Bagai and Raza Rehman saw Canada through to the end.